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7B is here! The Walking Dead returned tonight in an adrenaline packed episode that reunited old friends and introduced new ones.

The episode picked up exactly where 7A left off: with the group at The Hilltop trying to convince Gregory he needed to join them in their fight against Negan.

While this didn’t work, hope was still there as Jesus introduced the group to King Ezekiel at The Kingdom. Unfortunately, this also didn’t work.

This whole interaction was a long time coming and as a viewer it was incredibly exciting to see these three communities come together (I mean, not really, but they all know the others exist now).

We made it almost all the way through the episode thinking that things might actually be starting to look up. Surely The Hilltop and The Kingdom will eventually be convinced to join Rick and the others and they’ll defeat Negan.

They finally had one up on the Saviours. Negan and his men don’t know the three groups know about each other.

Not only that, but Team Family managed to get their hands on some explosives that were set up and meant to protect The Sanctuary from Walkers, but will now be used against them instead.

Then, in true Walking Dead style, in the last ten seconds the group once again seems to be in immediate danger (though it seems Rick disagrees).

While out looking for Gabriel the group is surrounded by an even larger group of people.

At first I thought they were Saviours, but then realized the weapons were all wrong. Then I thought it was that group Tara had met, but then saw there were men and knew it couldn’t be them either.

And, despite Rick smiling and seeming very happy, I was definitely yelling at my screen by the time the credits rolled.

The only thing this episode was missing was a reunion between Carol and the others. Though, with Daryl now staying The Kingdom, I suspect that will happen sooner rather than later.

Next weeks episode looks amazing and I can’t wait for next Sunday to get here.

****WARNING: This post contains spoilers for last night’s episode of The Walking Dead****

Season 6 | Episode 9 | Aired: February 14, 2016

The Walking Dead is back! It’s back and boy did it return with a bang!

Yes, last night was the mid-season premier of season six and I honestly think this is the best episode of the entire series. I’ve been saying that a lot lately so that’ll tell you just how amazing season six has been so far.

We pick up directly where the mid-season finale left off with Daryl, Sasha, and Abraham being confronted by members of Negan’s group. Just when it seems like a member of Team Family is going to get killed in the first thirty seconds of the episode, something unexpected happens.

Daryl hits Negan’s gang with a bazooka or rocket launcher or something similar and literally blows them away. Daryl Dixon, ladies and gentlemen, the biggest badass to ever exist.

Seriously, what a freaking amazing way to start the show. They kept showing that scene in the previews up until the point the explosion happens and I was not expecting that at all! Then Daryl just walks out from behind the truck all badass with his rocket launcher and it was AMAZING!

Back in Alexandria, things are less amazing. Walkers are everywhere and Rick, Michonne, Carl (carry Judith), Ron, Sam, Jessie, and Father Gabriel are attempting to make their way through the herd. However, things very quickly go wrong.

Father Gabriel takes Judith to his church where they’ll be safe (why would you trust this man with your baby? After everything he did!), but the others keep moving forward. That is, until Sam sees a young boy walker and freaks out, remembering what Carol had said to him about the monsters coming to get him.

Now this whole scene really tripped me out because I wasn’t sure if maybe Sam was imagining it or what was happening. I thought maybe after everything that had happened he had finally cracked, but no, unfortunately that’s not what happened. It was not imagined or a hallucination, the monsters really did get him.

The walkers got Sam which, of course, set Jessie off (understandable, she’s seeing her son being torn apart in front of her). She then starts screaming which brings the walkers down on her (nice Walking Dead guys, kill Rick’s sort of love interest on Valentine’s Day!). To make matters worse, Rick is forced to cut off Jessie’s arm to save Carl as Jessie is still holding onto him even as the walkers devour her.

Now, before I move onto one of the biggest, if not the biggest, thing to happen in the episode can I just say that I was actually kind of sad to see the rest of the Anderson family (because yes, we also lose Ron).

Like, yeah Ron was a lil’ shit and Jessie annoyed me to no end at points (it was getting better though! I was starting to like Jessie more), but I was really sad they killed Sam! I knew the Andersons died in the comics so I figured it was going to happen, but I was hoping maybe if they killed Ron and Jessie they’d let Sam live and give him to Carol or something.

Either way, I’m sad to see the actors go. Alexandra Breckenridge (Jessie), Austin Abrams (Ron), and Major Dodson (Sam) all did a fantastic job. Their characters were memorable and they went out with a bang. Congrats to all three of them on their phenomenal job on the show, on any future projects, and on being the first characters we actually cared about to be killed in this half of the season!

Alright, now let’s move on to something major that happened last night. Like I said before, Ron was lil’ shit and he lived up to this right to the very end when Michonne stuck her sword through his back. Why did she do this? Ron was going to kill Rick. Obviously, Ron’s rage was aimed at the right person, but at the same time can you really blame him for being pissed at Rick?

Rick killed his dad and as far as Ron’s concerned, Rick’s the one who led them out into the herd which just killed his mom and brother in front of him. Thankfully, Michonne steps in before Ron can kill Rick. However, the gun still goes off and instead of Rick being shot, it’s Carl who gets hit. Right in the eye.

That’s right, it happened! Carl lost his eye! I’ve been saying for how many reviews now that this was coming and it finally happened and it was gross and gruesome and so amazing! I am really excited to see how this progresses the characters as it’s safe to say this will have a major impact on all of them, but what will that impact be? We’ll just have to wait and see.

I do have to say though that Andrew Lincoln and Chandler Riggs did a great job in this scene. They both do phenomenal in all their scenes, but this one in particular, their reactions were spectacular and the whole thing was so well done.

Now, the episode ends on kind of a happy note. Sasha, Daryl, and Abraham make it back to Alexandria and they, along with Rick, the rest of Team Family, and the Alexandrians all pull together to take back their home. This resulted in one of the most badass montages I’ve ever seen with everyone taking down walkers left, right, and center.

And can I just say, before I move on, I was terrified they were going to kill Aaron or Eric. In the comics Eric dies when the walkers invade Alexandria and I was literally yelling at my TV screen because I was terrified either he or Aaron were going to die. Thankfully they didn’t which means Ross Marquand and Jordan Woods-Robinson will be back on my screens again! Thank you Walking Dead creators for giving us that.

Also, please take a look at this photo and tell me that Eric isn’t totally badass. He ran out of the house to kill some walkers and then they show at the end of the episode that he did all that in a freakin’ boot cast for his ankle. Badass level is off the charts.

This episode was intense and insane, but oh so amazing and I can’t even imagine how they’re going to top this. So much more happened that just what I talked about here so if you haven’t already seen the episode you need to.

We’ve seen so many of the characters do a complete flip in this episode and everything that happened is only going to inspire more evolution for all of them and I can’t wait to see where things go from here.

What did you think of the mid-season premier?

Did you cry more at the loss of the Andersons or Carl’s eye?

Next week’s episode looks beyond amazing! It looks like it’s very Daryl and Rick focused so I can’t wait!

So I did a countdown leading up the season premier of my top ten favorite episodes of The Walking Dead. After watching this episode I definitely need to reevaluate that list cause this episode was amazing! Seriously, definitely one of my favorites.

Kevin Smith described it on Talking Dead as “receiving oral that won’t stop.”

After last week’s episode that I thought was amazing (though apparently a lot of people didn’t?) I thought for sure this episode was going to feature the herd hitting Alexandria. Nope, not at all, we didn’t see the herd, we didn’t even see Rick and the others at all!

Instead we saw The Wolves attacking Alexandria and holy geez they were not holding back. I think I said that last week too, but I didn’t know the meaning of not holding back until there were people hacking each other up in the streets of Alexandria.

This episode starts off with us getting to see Enid’s journey to Alexandria which I thought was amazing and so mesmerizing.

From there we return to the group in Alexandria and this episode follows what they were doing while the others were leading the herd away. They were kicking ass is what they were doing, Carol especially.

So many Alexandrians died and so many wolves died. It’s funny because they said it on Talking Dead and I didn’t realize it until they did, but no one that we really cared about died this episode. There was a massive slaughter, but it wasn’t any members of the group and it wasn’t any of the Alexandrians we’ve gotten to know which was strange and yet refreshing.

We also see what the horn was at the end of the last episode (it wasn’t Ron and while it was technically The Wolves, they didn’t do it on purpose). The episode ends with The Wolves either dead or run out of Alexandria and it seems like the worst is over, but I think we all know it’s not, right? That herd is going somewhere and somewhere is Alexandria.

I loved this episode! It was so well done and all the actors were amazing!

Melissa McBride! Oh my gosh where do I even start? I bow down to her! The character progression Carol has gone through in this series is phenomenal and she is absolutely one of, if not the most, badass characters on this show.

She was just taking Wolves down left, right, and centre. It needed to be done, she knew that, she got it done. But I think one of the most significant moments was right at the end of the episode where she’s holding the cigarettes and sees Sam’s A stamp on the porch of the house and she starts to breakdown.

She does what she needs to in order to survive, but that doesn’t mean she likes it and it doesn’t mean she wants to do it. Melissa McBride has done an amazing job in every episode since the first season, this episode especially I want to give her a standing ovation. Or at the very least all the awards because she seriously deserves them.

I also need to give huge applause to Katelyn Nacon (Enid), Chandler Riggs (Carl), Major Dodson (Sam), and Austin Abrams (Ron). There are so many great kid/teen actors out there, but to get four who are this good in the same show, and especially a show like The Walking Dead is truly amazing. They all did a great job in their roles tonight and I can’t wait to see what happens.

Where did Enid go? Will Carl just survive somehow? Is Sam still locked in his closet? And what will Ron do now he’s seen his mom kill someone? So many questions and I desperately we hope we get these answers next week!

I love Enid’s character! We saw little bits of her last season and she was kind of weird, but she was such a pinnacle this episode. We saw how she got to Alexandria and we saw her bonding a bit with Carl as she helped him protect Judith, and then she basically had one of the best lines on the show and she never even said it out loud once.

“Just Survive Somehow”. JSS. This is amazing and something that will definitely stick with the characters and the viewers I think for the rest of the season and maybe even outside the show.

One character I’m still really torn on is Morgan. I want to like him, sometimes I do like him, but when he let The Wolves leave asdfghjkl. YOU NEVER LET THEM LEAVE! I know he wasn’t there for Terminus, but we were! We all know this was a bad idea! He let The Wolves live once before and they returned! One of them tried to kill him! Come on Morgan, I’m desperately trying to like you dude.

A character who’s actually starting to grow on me (surprisingly) is Jessie. I’m still not a fan of the Jessie/Rick relationship that might happen, but Jessie as her own badass character is definitely something I can get on board with.

She went absolutely nuts on the woman who came into her house and it was simultaneously terrifying and amazing. Terrifying because she killed her and was not holding back, but amazing because now we’re seeing what Jessie capable of when she needs to be and this opens up so many more doors for this character.

Also, like I mentioned above, Ron saw this all happen. Sam was locked in his closet, but Ron saw the whole thing so I’m really curious to see if this is what will finally make him realize that everything Rick is saying is true and that Rick isn’t the bad guy.

We’re also seeing this in Eugene! Eugene spent quite a lot of time helping Tara, Eric, and Alexandria’s new doctor, Denise, try and save one of the women The Wolves attacked. He actually played a pretty key part when he told Denise that she doesn’t want to be a coward. This was significant for him because he was owning that part of himself and I’m interested to see if we’ll see him slowly start to gather more courage like last season with Tara or what’s going to happen.

Something I don’t really want to see happen is a Eugene/Denise romance. They talked about it on Talking Dead and Paul Bettany said if they had kids their kids would be the most nervous children ever which is not good growing up in the zombie apocalypse. Yes. Just yes.

There were two characters this episode I felt really bad for and that’s Deanna and Aaron. Deanna finally saw what Rick was talking about. She understands now that if people or walkers want to get in they will find a way and unfortunately she realized that after a bunch of her people had been slaughtered.

I feel like we’re going to see a lot of Aaron blaming himself next episode, especially if what I think is coming actually does happen. I haven’t read all the comics yet, but I know what happens. I’m not going to say anything because I am firmly against spoilers, but oh my gosh it had better not happen!

But yes, Aaron discovers his bag on one of the dead Wolves. The same bag he lost back in the season five finale when he and Daryl got trapped in the van. The same bag that had all his photos of Alexandria in it. Oh no, oh Aaron, I just want to give him a hug.

Technically… what happened is his fault because he’s the one who took the pictures and then lost them, but he’s so adorable and he looked so sad and I just can’t be mad at him for it. That is definitely going to have some major repercussions though.

This week was insane! Completely, absolutely insane! So much happened and we’re only on episode two! Oh my god I can’t wait for the rest of this season.

Next week looks crazy and of course we’ll get to see the rest of the group returning to Alexandria and we’ll get to see what happens with the herd. Will they get them back on track or will the herd hit and the now dilapidated Safe Zone? I think we all know the answer to that.

Let me know what you thought about tonight’s episode! What was your favorite part? What did you think of Carol taking on The Wolves?

Also, I would like to say thank you to Major Dodson for tweeting me. Apparently he saw my post during my Walking Dead episode countdown and tweeted at me about it. As The Walking Dead is one of my favorite shows and he plays such a great character I was pretty much jumping up and down because I was so excited and it completely made my day.